Distinction
by The RyRy
Summary: Baralai has discovered Gippal doing something inappropriate... but is it really Gippal? GippalBaralai, written for the challenges "Gippal has an imposter!" and "Baralai gets dragged to a strip club".


**Distinction  
**(Written by RyRy, for TWO challenges "Gippal has an imposter!" and "Baralai gets dragged to a strip club", and because Angel dared me to.)

"Wait until you see what I found Gippal doing!"

Baralai didn't really care that much… he didn't think. It was Gippal, right? That guy did all kinds of crazy things that nobody had much business knowing about. "Rikku," he protested, trying to wrench his hand away from her as she dragged him down the streets of Luca. "You called me here for an 'important meeting'… is this your idea of an important meeting?"

Rikku didn't stop dragging him along behind her, giving her answer in quick huffs of frustrated exasperation. "Well, that was for something else. Yunie wanted to talk to you about some Yevon stuff and asked me to contact you, since she's too busy with Tidus to do it for herself!"

Baralai thought he detected a hint of anger in Rikku's tone.

"But just before you got here, I found Gippal doing this, and thought since, you know, you're his best friend and all, you could talk him out of it!"

Baralai's stomach tightened up. Gippal was clearly doing something he shouldn't if it was bad enough for Rikku to drag him all this way in the busy evening time in Luca.

"Look, I can't really promise I can do anything, but…" He wanted to tell her to just let him go back to the airship and meet Yuna and go back to Bevelle, but even Baralai had an element of curiosity in his system that demanded to be met with. "I'll at least see what's going on." It was more because he wanted to see exactly what kind of situation Gippal had gotten himself into this time then he felt like being a good Samaritan that day.

"Kay, you're seriously not going to believe this," Rikku replied, turning her head back to look at him quickly before pulling him down a little side street.

Baralai didn't recognize the area they were walking through, and the only way he could describe it in his mind was that it was a little bit seedy. Had Gippal had a run-in with some sort of underground gang in Luca? That would be pretty bad, and certainly something Gippal would get involved in.

Then Rikku dragged him into a place called the Full Monty, which had dark curtains over its windows and a string of blue lights hanging across the door. Everything was dark and blocked off. A frightening looking man eyed Rikku and Baralai both, laughed, and held out his hand.

Rikku fumbled in a pocket that Baralai couldn't even figure out how it existed in her little… shorts… skirt… thing, and eventually she pulled out some gil and placed it firmly in the ominous-looking man's hand.

He then opened the door, and Baralai's ears were greeted with a blast of loud music.

Rikku led him inside and firmly plunked him down on a rickety wooden chair. Baralai looked left and right around him. Where was Gippal? What was Rikku doing? There were random people who were all looking at him and smiling, nodding their heads. They were all men, except for a woman or two scattered here and there. There was no sign of Gippal.

Mirrors lined the walls, and Baralai was busy trying to figure out their purpose when Rikku smacked him on the knee. "Look, silly!" she chided, pointing in front of her.

Baralai looked, and immediately wished he hadn't.

There was Yuna… really rather naked, swinging herself off a pole on a stage, and picking up her clothes from a pile near an exit door.

"Yuna!" he gasped, immediately cover his mouth and looking away. He hadn't just seen that.

"Give it up for Nella, portraying Yuna," a voice said, booming over the speakers on top of the throbbing music. "Nella is available for private showings backstage. Remember to tip your dancers!"

"Wait, that's someone portraying Yuna?" Baralai amended, then laughed as he saw people immediately stand up and go to a window in the back of the room next to the stage. He presumed that was for the private showing spoken of, or maybe for dropping off tips.

Baralai had never been in such a place before, but he had been in the military, and had heard many of his comrades talking about it. It was just another vice of Spiran society, he supposed.

"Yeah, they're portraying everybody tonight. It's costume night, or something, they've even got someone pretending to be you up there," Rikku said, wrinkling her nose. "But he's pretty bad. Not even the right skin color."

Baralai wasn't entirely certain that he'd like to see someone portraying him at a strip club, anyway. "So what does this have to do with Gippal?" he asked.

"Yeah, that's the thing. I came here because I saw someone dressed up like me and I wanted to know what they were doing!" Rikku waved her arms about, even though she spoke in a hushed whisper that Baralai had to read her lips to understand. "But when I came in, there was a Seymour impersonator onstage, and he was really bad, and I laughed, but then… this guy came out, and I swear it was Gippal!"

Baralai paused for a moment, just staring at her. "You know, Gippal probably isn't hard to impersonate, Rikku," he said with a sigh. "He looks - pardon my stereotyping, please - like a fairly typical Al Bhed." He made a motion with his hand to his hair. "Just spike the hair and put on an eyepatch, and any good looking young Al Bhed man could probably pull off a Gippal impersonation."

Rikku's eyes widened. "Did you just call Gippal good looking?"

Baralai blinked. "Well, he is." He thought that much was obvious.

Rikku just giggled. "Anyway, you have to see him. This guy was just… so Gippal! I was just waiting for him to step off the stage and hit me on the shoulder and call me Cid's girl!" She looked at the stage, then leaned in closer to Baralai and whispered, "I think it really is him. You'll see."

Leaning back in the chair, Baralai decided to get comfortable. It clearly couldn't be Gippal, and Rikku was just making a big deal out of it for no reason. He just hoped that at least the dancers would be aesthetically pleasing, because Baralai would never deny his appreciation for the beauty of the human body. And, he knew, there had to be some talent to dancing in this manner. He had heard plenty of stories from his comrades.

And this would make a great story to tell Gippal later.

"Next up, the newcomer to the Full Monty," the mysterious voice said over the speakers, "The forerunner for our prize of the night, Kubbec portraying Gippal of the Machine Faction."

Baralai suppressed a snicker. Kubbec. That was Gippal translated into Spiran, and quite a clever nickname for the dancer. Baralai was proud of his knowledge of the Al Bhed language, and was surprised at how useful it had become in his lifetime.

Then, "Gippal" came out on stage.

Baralai nearly choked. This Kubbec guy was the spitting image. He was tall and lean (though Baralai thought that he was maybe a little bit too tall) and had very defined muscular arms. His hair had been spiked at one time, though it was drooping a little now perhaps due to the perspiration that undoubtedly collected during dancing of the sort that he was doing now.

Baralai scrutinized the body of the dancer, clad in only a pair of tight-fitting black pants, looking for inconsistencies with the Gippal that he knew. The dancer's stomach was very defined with clear edges to the muscles… but Baralai had never seen Gippal's stomach, really. He only had vague memories of seeing Gippal shirtless a time or two in the mornings… he had never really been looking.

There was also the matter of the eyepatch. The one that the dancer was wearing was clearly only a piece of black cloth, where Gippal would obviously be wearing his nice leather one.

What else? Baralai wondered as Rikku poked him in the knee. He diverted his eyes from the dancer to the girl next to him. "I see you staring at him!" she said, giggling.

"I'm trying to prove you wrong," Baralai replied, not really sure why she was giggling.

"What's the verdict, huh?"

"I think he's a little too tall," Baralai replied, gesturing to the dancer. "Also, he's wearing a cloth eyepatch. Gippal wouldn't be caught dead in one of those."

"That all?"

Baralai blinked. Did he need more evidence? Well, it wouldn't be too hard to find…

…if the dancer hadn't just taken off his pants.

Oh, he was entirely naked now. Baralai had never seen Gippal fully naked before, so his previous experience certainly wasn't going to help him now. And… he was dancing.

That pole, instead of being an obstacle to just hang on, was now becoming a full assistant to the dancing. "Gippal" was presently swinging on it, the shadows from the various odd-colored lights in the room crossing over his body, and he was circling the pole holding on only by the crook of his elbow. Placing his bare feet on the pole, he vaulted himself higher in the air, then closed his knee around the pole and hung off horizontally, extending his arms out beside him. As he circled, his movements seemed to grow slower and more graceful, and he twisted his body up so his head nearly touched the ceiling, shifting his hands to get a new grip on the pole.

Baralai felt his jaw drop, watching the dancer's fluid movements on the pole. This was a skill that certainly took a lot of practice… practice that the real Gippal would never have.

…right?

"Gippal" was now hanging upside-down, holding on with his hands as he crossed his ankle over his knee and tumbled his lower body down over his head until his feet were on the pole again. With a quick push off the ground, he circled again, climbing higher on the pole again… and then, fluidly and gracefully, he launched his feet off the pole…

…and put them on the ceiling.

Baralai felt his eyes starting to go dry from staring. How long had it been since he blinked? He couldn't bear to take his eyes off the body and the intricate dancing. He wasn't even certain how any of that was possible, how the body could be carrying that sort of momentum to perform those sorts of maneuvers.

Clearly, that couldn't be Gippal, right?

What else did he know of Gippal? He had to stop watching the dancer and start thinking. Gippal was an Al Bhed, he had lost his eye… when he was very young. He never said exactly how. Baralai supposed that one way it could all be proven was to take off that makeshift eyepatch that the dancer was wearing and see if there was an eye under there or not.

That would require actually being able to touch him though. They were too far away for that.

"So, whatcha got?" Rikku said, elbowing Baralai in the side as the music stopped and "Gippal" got down off the pole. The people watching applauded and threw gil onto the stage, which the dancer collected as he picked up his clothes.

Baralai could hardly breathe. That had been the most erotic thing he had ever seen. "I suppose," he said, trying to compose himself, "that one surefire test would be to see if there really is something under that eyepatch."

Rikku frowned. "I was hoping you'd be more helpful than that!"

Baralai shrugged. "Couldn't we always just go ask him?"

Shaking her head, Rikku gestured toward the window next to the stage. "You have to get a private showing in order to actually talk to them, or I would have done that hours ago!"

"So why don't you get a private showing?"

"They only sell them to men!"

Baralai paused, staring at her as the facts fell together in his mind. "So… you're saying…"

Rikku giggled and patted Baralai on the shoulder. "Oh, you're such a good friend! Here, let me go set it up!"

Before Baralai could even breathe, Rikku was at the window, presumably…

…no, Baralai didn't want to think about it.

But a private showing? What did that entail? He'd heard stories of what men did with women in such clubs, he'd heard the whisperings about the places where the women were most open to such things. He'd never… actually… thought that he would do it before.

And certainly not with a man. More specifically, certainly not with a man who looked stunningly like Gippal.

Rikku returned moments later, patting Baralai on the elbow. "They said it'll be a few minutes, but you're all set up!"

Baralai couldn't even speak. He was just convincing himself that he would go into the private showing, ask the appropriate questions, try to see under that eyepatch, and then leave. That was all!

Why was she doing this to him? What had Baralai ever done to her?

There was no time to ask or answer that question. "Gippal" came out from behind the stage a moment later and took Baralai by the hand. To the sounds of many cat-calls and whistling, Baralai was led backstage, to a private box.

A private box with a door that locked that was entirely covered in mirrors.

"Gippal" indicated for Baralai to sit on a futon that was set up along one side of the box, then got on his knees in front of him and began to feel his chest.

"Wait," Baralai said, before things got out of hand. He couldn't breathe. What was going on? "Are you really Gippal?"

"Gippal" looked up at him, a cocky look in his Al Bhed eye. "'Course. Just like you're really Baralai." He then laughed. "Or at least the spitting image of him."

Baralai nearly choked. That was Gippal's voice. Or… at least… he thought it was, over the pounding of the music.

"Wait, let me see under your eyepatch," Baralai protested as "Gippal" began to feel across his chest again. "Please?"

"None of your business. You bought me, now enjoy me, Praetor."

The teasing in the use of Baralai's title struck a chord in Baralai's mind. This pretend-Gippal was clearly thinking that Baralai was a pretend-Baralai.

That made Baralai relax, just a little bit.

He relaxed so much that he didn't seem to notice or care about "Gippal"'s hands across his chest, running up his neck, nor the kisses that fell under his chin and ears. It was all so erotic and sensual, and it was moving so fast that he barely had time to register what was happening before "Gippal" had moved onto the next bit of sensual pleasure.

As Baralai felt the fastenings of his robe loosen and his shoulders become bared, he felt like he should have been resisting. This pretend-Gippal was clearly trying to have sex with him…

The hands on his chest felt so nice, though, and Baralai couldn't even think. Even if this was a random stranger, it was also kind of Gippal, right? At least, it looked like Gippal, and Baralai could pretend like it was Gippal…

…he wasn't entirely sure why that soothed his nerves. He'd never thought of Gippal that way, and never wanted to. Gippal was just Gippal, his friend. But now… with a pretend-Gippal, there would be no consequences of losing friendship over this. This was like testing an alternate option with no ill effects if something went wrong.

Sort of.

Baralai lost all train of thought when "Gippal" kissed him.

He decided to not think about it and to give in. What was the harm in a little thing like this? It wasn't like Baralai had never had random sex before…

…well, maybe it was like that. He hadn't ever had random sex before - he had always been in relationships when it had happened.

But this wasn't random sex. This was Gippal. Gippal wasn't random.

…sort of.

Baralai gave up on thinking. He let "Gippal" do as he would to him, and their clothes came off, and that was when the lines really got blurred. Baralai called out Gippal's name, and Gippal called out Baralai's, and eventually Baralai forgot both that Gippal wasn't really Gippal and that he, Baralai, was really Baralai.

…until Baralai ran his hands over "Gippal"'s chest and felt a raising roughness of the skin, the remnants of a wound.

…at the same time that Gippal ran his hand over "Baralai"'s back and felt a clear indentation of a scar.

And suddenly, the distinction between real and impersonation entirely ceased to exist.


End file.
